Group offers to job-share $400,000 post

Kathy Cawsey has applied for the president’s job at the University of Alberta, although she doesn’t really want it.

And neither do the three friends and colleagues who applied with her.

That’s with her.

As in, on the same application.

Cawsey, an associate professor at Dalhousie University in Halifax, and her co-applicants told the university’s board of governors they were applying for the job as a team, willing to split the $400,000 salary and additional benefits.

They did it as a lark but in an attempt to make a point about university spending on administrators when many institutions are crying poor and cutting staff or not hiring people full time.

Cawsey said it started when a friend posted the job on Facebook. Cawsey jokingly told an untenured professor friend at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont., that she should apply.

The joke grew from there, she said, and some friends chimed in on the discussion.

“I said we could all apply for it, given the salary,” Cawsey said.

A while after that, she decided that was a good way to make a point. So the cover letter went to the board of governors, addressing many of the qualifications the job posting set out. Other people joined in, also applying in groups of four, totalling 56 people.

“We believe that by job-sharing this position, we would be able to do a better job than any one person could do — and the salary is certainly ample enough to meet the needs of all four of us,” the letter reads in part.

“Indeed, for many of us, one-fourth of your proposed minimum salary would double or triple our current wage.”

The letter points out that Cawsey and her co-applicants have academic and administrative leadership totalling more than 30 years, extensive experience in inspiring the human spirit through teaching thousands of students in hundreds of classes and collectively earned doctorates and other degrees, “which we believe will surpass the ‘exceptional intellectual calibre’ of any of your other single applicants.”

They also wrote that they “believe that our commitment to higher education is evident in our willingness to job-share and to each take only a fair and reasonable salary, rather than one which is four or five times that of a tenured academic and at least 10 times that of a sessional.”

They suggested the roles and responsibilities could be divided among the four and they could each teach one class.

“As you can see, four people can manage this job far more effectively than any one single person, however qualified that person might be for a half a million in compensation.

“We can spell off the dreary business of convocation, with one person attending/presiding while the other three continue on with the much-needed work of the president/vice-chancellor’s office, rather than having to take a week’s hiatus every April.”

Cawsey said she doesn’t expect a response.

“It was all about making the point in a non-aggressive and humorous way.”

She said the protest isn’t specifically against the Edmonton university.

“It’s about the disconnect between the salary and the process and the rhetoric of austerity.”

Cawsey said presidents have a tough job, “but it raises the question of whether this person is really contributing as much to the university as four full professors would contribute.”

She said she thinks the point would be made if every job that pops up in the next five years gets applications like these, but other light-hearted action could help too.

“I think that if enough people were continually making small points, then, in the end, things would gradually change. It’s going to be a slow change of culture of universities and university administration rather than an overnight change.”